emaily sent to Tina Townsend but posted for anyones perusal...

Pondering what to do this weekend I thought it would be good to go into London to Spitalfield market and have a browse and then I remembered that there is a French Huguenot Church around that area where it has been said that one of my ancestors - a Mr Mean - may be buried there. The story in the family goes that he fled France and came to England during the Catholic/Huguenot war by way of an orange basket on a boat.

I don't know whether this story has been artistically embelished over the years but it has always captured my imagination. The problem is that, unfortunately, a rather large chunk of that side of my family have passed away so to gather any more info direct from anyone is no longer possible.

As I checked on the net for a possible location for this church where the said Mr Mean may be buried I came across the RootsWeb.com site and searched for Mean which threw up several results mostly centred around you. I hope you don't mind me contacting you as I became intrigued by the thought that there was another line of Mean's descendants somewhere else in the world.

My family history is somewhat patchy at best. All I can say is that my mothers name was Shirley Anne (Walkington-) Mean and was born near Manchester/Liverpool. Obviously a member of the Mean family married a member of the Walkington family at some point. This is about as good as it gets from my meager knowledge. I am due to go to my Great Aunts (Dorothy Mean) 93rd birthday in a couple of weeks so I may find out more about this side of the family but would be interested in any light you could shed on the subject. My Grandfather (mothers father) was Ronald Mean. Unfortunately both Grandfather and Mother have died but other than the orange basket incident we never really spoke of our family ancestry. I hope I don't unearth some hideous family secret! (joke).

If you are aware of anyone above or links to the Mean family of old I would be incredibly happy if you could let me know.

Thanks in advance.
Hope to hear from you soon.

Greig

32 years old and happily married to an Aussie called Phoebe (McDonald) and live in Mortlake, London.